


Walking in a Winter Wonderland

by therestisjustconfetti



Category: The Haunting of Bly Manor (TV)
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/F, First Christmas Together, Fluff, Jamie really loves snow, Romance, They are so romantic and cheesy and happy, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, first winter together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-30
Updated: 2020-11-15
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:27:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27287146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therestisjustconfetti/pseuds/therestisjustconfetti
Summary: An English winter was never very snowy per se, but it was always wet. Wet and grey and sloppy. But winter and Christmas in Vermont? That was magical.Or, a story about how much Jamie loves the holiday season and how much Dani loves her.
Relationships: Dani Clayton/Jamie
Comments: 14
Kudos: 235





	1. Never Seen Snow Like This

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, friends! Back again with another fic, and this one is nothing but fluff. So much fluff. I hope this brings you some joy and I'm considering continuing it with a follow-up story about their first Christmas together - I would love to know if anyone wants to read that!
> 
> Enjoy! x

Winter in England was depressing. It was wet and grey and sloppy and disappointing. Not exactly the image you conjure up when thinking about the snowy season. When Dani and Jamie landed in Vermont in late autumn, snow was just around the corner and Jamie was almost giddy about it. Of course, she had experienced snow before, growing up in the north made that possible but it pales in comparison to the kind of snow she knew she was yet to experience. 

Real, proper snow. Though she never told Dani this, she would check the weather forecast regularly to ensure she didn’t miss the first big downfall. She wanted to stand outside and stare up at the big white sky and let those beautiful snowflakes land on her tongue, watch them swirl and dance around in the wind. Snow for Dani wasn't anything new, in fact, the midwestern winters she was accustomed to for most of her life were usually more of an annoyance than they were wonderful. The snow was nice, it was pretty when it first fell and you see it out the window early in the morning, but as an adult, it meant getting up early the next morning to shovel the driveway before work. It meant putting on every warm layer you had just to go out to the store, and it meant hooligan kids throwing icy snowballs at you that could be packed so hard they could leave a bruise. She was looking forward to sharing the winter weather with Jamie but wasn’t thrilled about what came with it. 

Dani and Jamie had rented a small one-bedroom apartment in a quiet town, a place they could hide away and be at peace with each other, and when Jamie saw a flyer for a Winter Festival, she knew they’d chosen a good place to settle down in. 

“Did you see this?” Jamie says one day when walking through the front door of their apartment. Dani is sitting on the living room couch reading a magazine and listening to the radio, she doesn’t look up at first. 

“I saw these at the cafe and grabbed one.”

“Hmm?” Dani replies, now pulling her eyes away from the book. 

Jamie takes off her coat and scarf and hangs them up beside the door then sits down beside Dani.

“In two weeks, there’s going to be a winter festival!”

Dani smiles endearingly at Jamie as she holds out the flyer for her to look at. “Well the snow better fall soon otherwise it’ll be a pretty disappointing winter festival, won’t it?” she says sarcastically and takes the flyer from Jamie’s hands, reading over all of the colourful information scrawled across it. 

It advertised winter carnival games, hot chocolate, sledding, a snowman building contest, and more. All very typical winter activities. But there was one problem, the snow was unseasonably late that year and while Dani didn’t mind, she could tell that Jamie was growing impatient and overly eager. 

Jamie takes the flyer back and narrows her eyes. “Hey, watch it. Keep talking like that and I won’t bring you as my date. You don’t even appreciate the snow. You don’t deserve it.”

“Not true,” Dani says, smirking. “I appreciate it, I just don’t love it. Winter is cold and dark and slushy.”

“Not at first though, yeah? At first, it's beautiful and new. It leaves the world a little untouched.”

There’s silence for a moment and the apartment is quiet. But then Dani chuckles a little to herself. 

“That was very poetic.”

Jamie laughs and playfully pushes Dani in the shoulder before taking her hand in her own and stroking the soft skin with her thumb. “I can be poetic when I want to be.”

Dani inches closer to Jamie and snuggles into her side. “Well I hope this winter is everything you want it to be.”

“You promise you’ll go out in the snow with me?” Jamie asks as Dani leans her head on her shoulder. “I need my winterized American to help guide me through it.”

“I promise.”

The next morning, Jamie wakes up and looks to her right to see Dani sleeping peacefully beside her. She is completely serene and content as her chest rises and falls with each soft breath. Jamie smiles and presses a soft kiss to her forehead then quietly pulls herself from the warmth of their bed, doing her best to not wake the sleeping blonde. She slips on a loose flannel and makes her way to the kitchen to boil water for tea, rubbing sleep from her eyes as she does. It’s the same routine as every other morning, a comfortable and simple one that she and Dani had settled into since making the apartment their home. 

She fills the kettle and sets it on the stove then turns the burner on. Like most mornings, she moves to the window to look at the world outside of their quiet space while she waits for the water to heat up and the view outside never changes much - but on this morning, it’s different. This morning, there’s snow. The tree branches outside the window hang heavy from the snow that had clearly been falling since the early hours of the morning and the cars parked on the road across the street have seemed to disappear into a white void. At first, Jamie doesn’t even know what to say. She stares in wonder as she takes in the wintery scene. Never in her life had she seen so much snow - three or four feet of it at least. And it was still falling, coming down silently and slowly, blanketing the town even more than it already had. She turns on her heels and hurries back to the stove to turn it off then goes back into the bedroom to tell Dani all about the winter wonderland that now exists right outside their own front door.

Dani is still sound asleep and Jamie slides back into the bed beside her and brushes some stray hair out of her face and cups her cheek. “Dani,” she says. Dani doesn’t respond, still tucked away in a deep sleep. “Dani,” she says again, this time a little louder. 

“Mmmm, g’morning baby,” Dani mumbles, half asleep with her eyes still closed. She instinctively reaches for Jamie and drapes an arm over her waist. 

The sound of her sleepy early morning voice sends warmth through Jamie’s body and she can’t help but smile. 

“Poppins, you have to look outside,” Jamie whispers. She brings a hand up to stroke Dani’s cheek and the blonde hums at the feeling. “Come look outside.”

“Shhhh. I’m sleeping,” Dani says. “Just five more minutes, mmkay? Let’s sleep for just five more minutes.”

“Dani, it snowed. A bloody lot.”

“Yay. You got your snow.”

Jamie laughs quietly and Dani cuddles in closer to her, seeking out the comfort and the closeness she always desires. Even in a half-sleep state, she craves the other woman’s touch and body. 

“Will you be my date to the winter festival?” Jamie asks.

Dani slowly blinks open her eyes and smiles. Her gaze is soft and Jamie’s heart flutters in her chest. 

“I get to throw the first snowball,” Dani replies.

Jamie brushes her nose against Dani then kisses her tenderly. They kiss for a few minutes before Jamie reluctantly pulls away and looks over at their window. 

Dani follows her eyes. “You’re dying to go outside, aren’t you?” 

“....no.”

Dani smirks and sits up in the bed. She runs her fingers through her messy bed hair and stretches her arms up above her head. Without saying anything, she gets out of their bed and stands beside it. 

“I thought you wanted to sleep a little longer?” Jamie asks. 

“Well my girlfriend wants to go outside and play in the snow and even though it’s only 7:30 am, that’s exactly what we’re going to do. Because I love her and I like seeing her happy.”

Jamie bounces up and down with excitement and crawls across the bed. She sits up on her knees and throws her arms around Dani’s neck. 

“You’re lucky you’re so cute,” Dani says as Jamie covers her face with kisses. 

Fifteen minutes later both Dani and Jamie stand by the door to their apartment all bundled up and ready for the elements. Dani doesn’t think she’s seen Jamie wear so many layers before and she smiles as she pulls a knit hat down onto her head.

“Come on then, Frosty. Let’s go.”

They step outside and Jamie spins in a circle as the densely falling snow covers her body. Flurries as a kid in England were one thing, but this was the beginnings of a blizzard and all Jamie could think was how mesmerizing it was - how it totally exceeded her expectations. 

“You have seen snow before, you know. You told me that. There is snow in England,” Dani says. She watches the woman she loves dance around in the snow with a childlike joy about her and laughs when Jamie sticks out her tongue to catch snowflakes in her mouth. 

“Not like this. Never like this. This is right out of a film.”

Dani looks around and understands what Jamie means. It’s beautiful and hard to ignore the peaceful quality it seemed to have. It was quiet, especially so for that time of the morning, but it often was during the first big snowfall of the season. There’s always a comfortable silence during a snowstorm, you can almost hear the snow falling and landing on the other snow around you and she remembers that most from winters as a child, how serene it could really feel. 

“When I was in the sixth grade, we had three snow days in a row and I remember spending every moment outside that I was allowed to.”

Jamie kneels and starts writing out words in the snow with her glove clad hand.

“Eddie and I would…” Dani doesn’t finish her sentence and Jamie looks up at her with concern. 

“You two were friends before anything else, Poppins. It’s okay to talk about those memories with him. They mean something to you.”

“Yeah. I know. It’s just...yeah.”

“How did you spend those snow days? Like this?” 

Jamie gathers a handful of snow and packs it into a ball then throws it right at Dani, hitting her square in the chest. 

Dani stumbles back overdramatically like she’s been shot. “Jamie! I said I get to throw the first snowball!” 

“My hand slipped.”

Jamie smiles and gathers up another handful of snow. 

“No,” Dani says. “Don’t you dare. I will march back inside and leave you alone out here to freeze.”

“Aww, come on. It’s just snow, Poppins. What’s there to be afraid of?”

Dani takes a step back and braces herself for another hit but Jamie just tosses it to the ground and walks towards her. She slides her arms around her waist and hugs her closely.

“I’m sorry I threw a snowball at you. And it’s fuckin’ freezing out here,” Jamie says and it makes Dani laugh deeply in her chest. 

“It’s not even 8 am and we’re outside in the snow like children.”

Jamie pulls back and shrugs her shoulders. “I wanted to stay in bed but you made me get all dressed up to come outside.” She winks and Dani rolls her eyes. 

“I love you,” Jamie says as she takes in the look of Dani’s rosy cheeks and watches as snowflakes land on her eyelashes. It’s a sight to behold and she wishes she could freeze the moment to keep forever because Dani looks so cute and cozy and innocent standing there in the snow. As cheesy as it may sound, Dani was Jamie’s snowflake. Beautiful, one of a kind, almost magical. Snowflakes are one of nature’s most fragile things, but together they can do so much. That’s how Jamie felt with Dani by her side. They were always stronger together. 

“I love you too. And I’ll love you even more if we can go inside now and get into a hot shower.”

“Poppins, you flirt.”

Dani takes a long deep breath and just shakes her head at Jamie who stands in the snow with a proud look on her face. 

________

Over the next two weeks, the snow continued to come down in heaps and piles and there was a buzz about the town as people prepared for the winter festival. For their small town, it was one of the biggest community events of the year and Dani and Jamie learned that it was an event everyone always looked forward to - and one that a lot of effort was put into. 

Christmas was just a few weeks away and lights had been strung up all around the area in preparation for the holiday, making the whole place feel even more like a winter wonderland. It was romantic, cozy, and somehow made their new home feel even more like home. 

“I wonder if there will be hot apple cider,” Jamie says as she moves around their kitchen putting away dishes. 

It’s mid-morning and Dani is sitting in the chair in the corner of the room humming along to some Christmas music that floats out from their radio. “Have you had hot apple cider before?” she asks. 

“No,” Jamie replies. “But I think I want to try it.”

“You might like it.”

“Poppins, you said the same thing about coffee once and it was bloody awful. Liquid dirt.”

“You mean you didn’t like my coffee? I’m hurt.” 

Dani smiles and gets up from the chair. She walks into the kitchen and kisses Jamie on the cheek. 

“Apple cider is nothing like coffee,” she says and picks up the last of the clean dishes and opens the cupboard. “It’s sweet and tart and warms you right up. It’s not better than hot chocolate, but you’ll like it.”

“You can be very convincing,” Jamie says, coming up behind Dani and closing any gap between them. She pins her against the counter and Dani shivers at the feeling of hot breath against the back of her neck. Jamie kisses her just below her ear and smiles. “I love that about you.”

Dani leans back into Jamie and a long sigh of comfort slips out of her mouth. “As nice as this is, we should get going. The festivities start in 45 minutes.”

“45 minutes?! Blimey. We need to get ready. I don’t want to miss anything.”

Jamie steps away from her and leaves the room to go gather her things. Dani stays leaning against the counter and thinks about just how many walls Jamie had let down since their conversation in the woods on that cold drizzly night. She wonders if there has ever been anyone else in her life who got to know her the way Dani knows her and if anyone else ever got to discover her soft and exceptionally kind inside, if anyone had ever gotten to see her so excited about the snow and apple cider and the simple things in life that most people overlook. It’s never lost on Dani just how lucky she is to be that person.  
________

Snow falls in big puffy flakes, the kind that looks pillowy and soft. It’s comfortably cold outside as people stroll about the town park, disappearing into the white world surrounding them. Dani and Jamie walk past booths and food carts, stopping anywhere that caught their eye. When Jamie spotted a ring toss game, she knew she wanted to play for the sole reason of winning Dani a small prize. 

“It’s three rings for $4 or five rings for $5,” the booth attendant says and Jamie brings out her wallet and hands over a $5 bill. 

Jamie was surprisingly good at ring toss and Dani grins like a child when the prize is handed to her. 

“Have you ever played that before?” she asks and leans into Jamie, sliding her arm around her waist. They continue their exploration of the festival and Jamie simply shrugs. 

“I’m full of surprises,” she replies. 

When they stroll past a woman selling hot apple cider, Dani stops and buys them each a small cup. She watches closely as Jamie brings it to her lips and takes a sip. Her face softens and her lips curl up into a slight smile. 

“Mmm, you were right Poppins. This is good.”

“My mom was always working a lot because my dad was never around so I always spent a lot of time with my grandmother when I was a kid - she used to make this and whenever I drink it, I think of her.”

Jamie takes another sip and nods in approval. “We should make this ourselves.”

Suddenly a snowball comes flying past them and a man runs by chasing after a small boy. Dani and Jamie both watch the scene unfold and laugh when the boy packs another snowball and throws it at the man. 

“Don’t get any ideas,” Dani says and bumps her shoulder against Jamie’s. 

After an hour of walking around the festival and indulging in sweets, more hot drinks, and games - they end up at a photobooth and sit down in a staged snowy scene on a sled. They cuddle into each other and a man with a polaroid camera sets up the shot.

“Say cheese,” he says and just as he presses the button, Jamie turns and kisses Dani’s cheek. Dani looks at her and as the snow falls around them, she thinks that it might be one of the most perfect moments she's ever had. She never imagined she’d be in a place where she got to be completely herself with a woman she loved more than anything in the world and it nearly brings tears to her eyes. Jamie squeezes her hand and Dani knows she feels the same way. 

“Put it in your pocket and let it develop for 20 minutes, try not to get the snow in it.”

The man’s voice catches their attention and they nod in agreement at his instructions then remove themselves from the sled.

After deciding they had each enjoyed enough of the festival, they leave the park and make their way back to the apartment. The snow has lightened up and only light flurries swirl through the air around them. Jamie holds her tongue out to try and catch as many as she can and when no one is in sight of them, she pulls Dani behind a tree and kisses her against it. The kiss is a promise of all the things yet to come and a celebration of how far they've come. It’s tender and soft and Dani sinks into the simple domesticity of it. 

Two blocks away from their apartment, a Christmas tree lot with bright twinkling colourful lights and garland hanging above it catches their eye. It’s only just popped up and they hadn’t noticed it yet while coming and going from their home. 

Christmas music plays and as they stand to admire the trees, Dani hums along again like she often did in their living room. 

“We should get one,” Jamie says. “We can do it all up and put it between the windows in the living room for our first Christmas together, Poppins. What do you think?”

When they had first made it back to America, the idea of Christmas frightened Dani a little bit. The unknown of what was to come over the next couple of months and the prospect of milestones reached with Jamie felt both thrilling and unsettling. And now, here they were - they had made it to the holidays and every day had been new and blissful. Now, the idea of a Christmas together was exciting and joyful. Dani wanted to take advantage of every moment with Jamie that she could because every moment mattered. 

“I think that’s a great idea,” Dani says and rests her head on Jamie’s shoulder. The lights above the tree lot shine on them and they stand that way admiring the trees as the snow continues to fall.


	2. You're The Only Gift I Need

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For the first time in a long time, Christmas for both Dani and Jamie is truly something special. 
> 
> Or, a continuation of Dani and Jamie's first winter spent in Vermont.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been getting into the Christmas spirit myself and decided to continue my winter story and give these two a lovely Christmas together.

Christmas time had arrived in the quiet town where Dani and Jamie had settled, and magic seemed to fall with every snowflake. A week after the Winter Festival, Jamie decides that they were going to go out get a Christmas tree for the apartment. Choosing one at the tree lot was easy enough, even if Dani tried to protest Jamie’s final choice.

Getting it back to the apartment though...that was interesting. Together they lugged it up the stairs, needing to take breaks here and there to adjust their grips on the tree. Dani was starting to regret their decision to get a tree at all given how difficult the process of getting it up the stairs turned out to be.

“Please tell me again why we couldn’t get the small one?” Dani asks as she grips the base of the tree, trying to maneuver it through the doorway and into their apartment, Jamie pulling hard on the other end.

“Because,” Jamie answers, giving the tree one more tug and finally pulling it inside. She brushes her hands off on her pants and proudly places them on her hips. “If we’re doing this Christmas thing, it should be a proper Christmas. Who wants a small tree when the big ones are this bloody brilliant?”

Dani steps into the apartment and over the tree. She comes to stand by Jamie’s side and crosses her arms.

“And I didn’t want the small one,” Jamie adds and shrugs.

“I hope you know that you’re sweeping up all the pine needles,” Dani says, resting her head on Jamie’s shoulder.

Jamie laughs a little bit. She turns and kisses the top of Dani’s head and slips an arm around her waist, pulling her close. “Aye aye, Poppins.”

Dani turns into Jamie and hugs her tightly. “So...what do you want to start with?”

Thirty minutes later the tree is standing up on its base and Jamie is untangling the third set of lights, the other two sets already hung on the tree and lighting up the room.

“Bloody hell, how do these things come so tangled right outta the box?”

Dani watches on from the kitchen as she prepares some hot chocolate for both of them. Outside their window, a dark and cold snowstorm rages on but inside, the room is full of light and warmth, even if Jamie is growing more and more frustrated by the lights in her hands, her British accent thick as she curses under her breath.

“Fuckin’ piece of shite,” she says, finally getting the string untied from itself.

“How ya doin’ over there?” Dani asks.

“Oh ya know, having a grand ole time.”

Dani picks up their mugs and walks out of the kitchen. She sits on the couch and Jamie places the final set of lights around the top of the tree. She plugs it into the other set and takes a step back, admiring her work.

“There we are,” she says.

“Here, come take a break.” Dani pats the spot beside her and Jamie sits down, taking one of the cups from her hands. “I have something for you.”

“Yeah?”

Dani puts her cup of hot chocolate down on the coffee table and disappears down the hall into their bedroom. A moment later she walks back into the living room with her hands behind her back.

“So...I thought about waiting to give this to you as a Christmas present but I wanted us to be able to watch it together.”

She brings her hands out from behind her back and holds out a VHS tape. Jamie recognizes the picture on the box and grins. “White Christmas.”

“Tomorrow is Christmas Eve,” Dani says, “and I thought we could watch it then...if you wanted to.”

Jamie stands up and approaches Dani. She cups her face in her hands and kisses her softly. It’s sweet and tender and makes Dani feel like she leaves her own body for a moment. It’s everything a kiss should be and when Jamie pulls away, Dani immediately misses the feeling of her lips.

“Poppins, I would love to watch White Christmas with you. It means a lot to me that you remembered, more than you know.”

Dani smiles and ducks her head down, suddenly feeling a bit shy for reasons she can’t really explain. “Well you mean a lot to me,” she says.

“Come here,” Jamie says. She hugs her and places a gentle kiss on her neck just below her ear. The sensation of Jamie’s warm lips on her neck makes Dani shudder a little bit and she knows if she doesn’t pull herself away, she’ll lose herself in Jamie completely right then and there and the Christmas tree would never finish getting decorated.

“We should...the tree...decorations,” Dani whispers. Jamie’s hands slide up under the back of Dani’s flannel shirt, her flannel shirt, the one Dani had changed into before they both lifted the tree up onto its base. It looks far better on her anyway, Jamie thinks. She kisses her neck again and Dani lets out a breath she didn’t know she was holding.

“We should,” Jamie agrees. “You’re right. The tree is very important.”

“Jamie,” Dani says, laughing a little as Jamie sucks her pulse point.

When Jamie pulls her lips away, she smiles and takes the VHS from Dani’s hands. “I mean it though, Poppins. Thank you for this.”

Together they spend the rest of the evening listening to Christmas music and covering the tree with sparkling ornaments and shining garland, laughing, telling stories as they go. Jamie helps Dani reaches up to put a star on top of the tree and when it’s all finished, they stand side by side and take in all of their hard work.

“Bloody brilliant. Bet you’re glad we got the big one now, hmm?” Jamie says, a slight smirk on her face.

”Fiiiiine. You were right. It looks great,” Dani replies.

”Sorry Poppins, what was that? I couldn’t quite hear you. Did ya say I was right?”

Jamie reaches for Dani and starts to tickle her, filling the room with beautiful laughter. 

Eventually, a pizza is delivered and they sit on the ground around the tree eating and drinking some wine that Jamie pours for both of them.

“Do you have a favourite Christmas memory?” Dani asks as she picks up another slice from the pizza box.

Jamie thinks about the question, knowing there were few moments from her childhood that instilled much joy and happiness but one does come to mind.

“It’s not much but one year, I must’ve been about seven, Denis took us out to pick our own Christmas tree from a tree farm just outside of town. That was one of the only years it ever really felt like we were a family, it felt normal almost. We picked a pretty dodgy lookin’ one, one of the cheapest ones the man was willing to sell. Money was always pretty tight but I was chuffed just to have a real tree at all.”

Dani listened intently, never taking her eyes off Jamie as she spoke. Both of their childhoods had been without normalcy - Dani with her single mom and no father in her life at all and Jamie with her parents who had been far too young to start a family at all, not really knowing how to take care of children or ever really making it seem as if they wanted to. But this Christmas was different, this year they had each other and it was already more special than any holiday had ever been.

“We made our own decorations for that tree, out of anything we could find really. Strung some popcorn across it, made a star out of aluminium foil I think. I was so proud. We weren’t poor, but never really had the money for things like holidays.”

“Jamie…”

Jamie looks up at their own tree - looking like a beacon of hope, joy, love. A reminder of how different her life had become since Dani walked into it, how much better, how much brighter. Dani reaches for her hand and entwines their fingers. “I’ve never had a tree that looked like this one. A real proper Christmas tree.”

“It really is a beautiful tree,” Dani says. Jamie turns and their eyes meet. At some point during the explanation of her memory, a few tears had gathered in her eyes and she wipes one away before it gets the chance to roll down her cheek.

“Yeah,” Jamie says, smiling. “It is. What about you, what’s your favourite memory?”

“This one,” Dani responds without skipping a beat. “I know it’s not a memory, but one day it will be. And it’s my favourite.”

“Who would have thought that one day the gardener and the au pair would be sitting beside their Christmas tree together eating pizza and drinking wine that if I’m being honest...is pretty shite.”

They both laugh and Dani smiles a smile that lights up her whole face, a smile that seems to make the room even brighter than the tree does.

“Oh! I almost forgot something,” Jamie says. She gets up and rifles through the boxes for all of the Christmas ornaments and retrieves a small item then holds it above Dani’s head.

“I know you Americans have this tradition,” she says as she dangles some fake mistletoe above Dani’s head.

“We do,” Dani replies, a cheesy grin on her face.

Jamie looks down at her with questioning eyes and Dani stands up. She doesn’t wait for Jamie to say anything else and simply puts her hand on the back of her neck and pulls her in for a deep kiss. Their lips move in perfect unison and Jamie drops the mistletoe, letting it fall to the floor. She puts her hand on the small of Dani’s back and disappears into the sensation of having the other woman so close to her.

The next morning, Dani rolls over in bed and stretches an arm out, searching for Jamie’s warmth. When she realizes the bed is empty she opens her eyes and frowns. She gets out of bed and pulls on another one of Jamie’s discarded shirts, inhaling the comforting scent that she has come to love and crave so much. She hears a voice singing along to Christmas music playing from the radio and walks out of the bedroom in search of the sound.

Jamie is standing by the window beside the Christmas tree watching the snowfall and quietly singing along to the familiar song playing from the sound system by the couch. Dani approaches her quietly, wrapping her arms around her from behind.

“Good morning,” she says and kisses Jamie’s shoulder. Jamie leans back into her embrace and releases a sigh of contentment.

“Mmm, mornin’, Poppins. Doesn’t it look so peaceful outside?”

Dani closes her eyes and kisses the back of Jamie’s neck. “It’s pretty peaceful in here too.”

“So what do people normally do on Christmas Eve?” Jamie asks.

“They come back to bed and watch movies with their girlfriend.”

Jamie turns around in Dani’s arms. “Nice shirt,” she says, smirking.

“This old thing? Thanks, I just found it lying around.”

“I think I might like what’s underneath the shirt more.”

Dani slowly starts walking backward in the direction of the bedroom. “Oh yeah? Well if you come back to bed, maybe you’ll get a look.”

Jamie chases Dani back down the hall towards their bedroom and they fall into the bed laughing.

The day passes by easily and comfortably for Dani and Jamie. They make breakfast together, add a few more ornaments to the tree, put their small handful of wrapped gifts below it and go for a walk outside in the snow. Every single part of it feels exactly as it should and neither woman could remember a Christmas that felt quite so joyful in the most peaceful and simple way. The evening rolls around and Dani pops the White Christmas VHS tape into the VCR in the bedroom and they settle into the bed, tangling their legs together.

The first notes of the familiar Christmas melody fill the room and Dani feels Jamie snuggle into her closer. It’s a perfect moment. The perfect moment. For years, Dani had lived with a longing that ached deep her chest, the longing for a moment like the one she was having right now. She never thought she’d get the chance to truly feel happiness like this, to know what it meant to live authentically with a person beside you that you could be yourself with in every single way. She had found that in the brunette snuggled in beside her, smiling from ear to ear as she fixed her eyes on the small television. She had found someone who was willing to take a chance and dive head first beside her into whatever was waiting on the road ahead. And no matter how many times she stopped to truly recognize that, it wouldn’t be enough.

In their little one-bedroom apartment with Jamie’s favourite Christmas film playing on the TV, Dani knew that everything was worth it. Everything that had brought them to this point and whatever would come next, it was all worth it for this moment. And she prayed to whatever being she could pray to for a million more nights like this, a million more perfect moments. Her beautiful life with Jamie was only just getting started and she would fight her hardest to be present for all of it because they both deserved so much more than what life had given them.

Jamie laughs at something and Dani feels warmth spread throughout her whole body, she knows she would be the luckiest woman in the world if she got to hear that addicting sound for the rest of her life. She looks at Jamie and takes in the colour of her eyes, the smile lines around her mouth, the way her soft curls falls around her face. It had all been committed to memory long ago, early on during their time back at Bly, but it was always worth admiring and Dani never missed an opportunity to do just that.

When she wakes up the next morning, she’s glad to find Jamie still beside her in the bed. The soft rise and fall of the brunette’s chest are calming and Dani watches her sleep for a few minutes until Jamie stirs a little and turns in towards her more, nestling her face into the crook of her neck.

“Happy Christmas,” she whispers, her breath warm against Dani’s skin.

“Merry Christmas, Jamie,” Dani says.

“The best Christmas I’ve ever had,” Jamie replies.

“Do you want to get up and open your presents?” Dani asks, running her hand up and down Jamie’s arm softly.

Jamie shakes her head. “You’re the only gift I need, Poppins.”

And it was the truth. All they ever needed was each other. Their lives were so different now. Their future would be so different, not like anything they had ever expected for themselves. And so they lay there together in bed on their first Christmas morning together, knowing just how lucky they were, understanding just how special it was to be making these memories together, and making a silent promise to never take it for granted.

They would eventually pull themselves from the bed and linger by the tree for most of the day, enjoying the festive decorations, Christmas atmosphere, and small gifts they picked out for the other but for now, they had no intention of getting out of bed because they were warm, happy, and so very content.

It really was the happiest Christmas. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed this! And please let me know if you’d like me to keep writing more stories about these two, and what kind of stories you’d like to read (:


End file.
